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SERMON 



ON THE 



OCCASION OF THE 



DEATH OF PRESIDENT LINCOLN. 



PREACHED IN THE 



SOUTH BAPTIST CHURCH, HARTFORD, CONN., 



SUNDAY, APRIL 16, 1865. 



v 



By REV. C. B. CRANE. 



HARTFORD: 

PRESS OF CASE, LOCKWOOD AND COMPANY. 

1865. 



'OfWASHWS 



flifc 






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Hartford, April 17, 1865. 

Rev. C. B. Crane. 

Dear Sir : Having listened to your sermon yes- 
terday, upon the sad event of the death of our late President, and 
fully endorsing the sentiments of the discourse, we respectfully 
solicit a copy for the press, believing that its circulation in a per- 
manent form will subserve the interests of justice and freedom. 
We are truly yours, 

ALBERT DAY, 

JAS. G. BATTERSON, 

HORACE J. MORSE, 

DANIEL F. SEYMOUR, 

E. OVERAND, 

JOSEPH L. BENNETT, 

A. M. SMITH, 

R. S. LAWRENCE. 



Hartford, April 18, 1865. 

Hon. Albert Day, James G. Batterson, Esq., 

Gen. Horace J. Morse, and others : 

The sermon which you request for publication, owing to its 
necessarily hasty preparation, greatly needs revision ; but since 
its circulation should be immediate, if ever, I hereby submit it to 
your disposal. 

I am most truly yours, 

C. B. CRANE. 



SEEMON. 



2 SAMUEL, 1 : 19. 



" THE BEAUTY OF ISRAEL IS SLAIN UPON THE HIGH PLACES ; 
HOW ARE THE MIGHTY FALLEN ! " 

The nation is weeping to-day ; and its temples and 
homes and places of business and public edifices are 
draped in mourning. Strong men, who could en- 
dure the shock of personal calamity and the pangs 
of personal bereavement with uncomplaining forti- 
tude, are shaken by the violence of their emotions, and 
their tears fall upon the pavement of the crowded 
street. Gentle women, secluding themselves at 
home, mourn as for a husband or a lover. The fes- 
tivities of society are checked, and plans for future 
gayety are stopped in their process of realization. 
Over the whole American sky are clouds and thick 
darkness. Threnodies are sung by quivering lips 
and wail from melancholy organs. All sounds are 
dirges, and the countenance of sorrow is adorned 
with the jewelry of tears. 



6 

Oh, friends, on the evening of Good Friday, the 
memorial day of the crucifixion of our Lord, our 
good, true-hearted, magnanimous, supremely loyal, 
great President was smitten down by the hand of 
the assassin; and y ester morn, at twenty-two. min- 
utes past seven of the clock, his noble and holy soul 
went up from its shattered and desecrated taberna- 
cle to its God. 

The terrible tragedy is consummated, its heart- 
rending denouinent has transpired, there can be no 
revision of it, it stands the blackest page save one 
in the history of the world. It is the after-type of 
the tragedy which was accomplished on the first 
Good Friday, more than eighteen centuries ago, 
upon the eminence of Calvary in Judea. 

Yes, it was meet that the martyrdom should occur 
on Good Friday. It is no blasphemy against the 
Son of God and the Savior of men that we declare 
the fitness of the slaying of the Second Father of 
our Republic on the anniversary of the day on 
which he was slain. Jesus Christ died for the world ; 
Abraham Lincoln died for his country. The conse- 
cration of Jesus to humanity began in the antiquity 
of eternity, and found its culmination when he cried 
with white, yet triumphant, lips, on the cross, " it is 
finished." The consecration of Abraham Lincoln to 
the American peojole had its phenomenal and most 



manifest beginning in the summer of 1858, when he 
entered upon that memorable Senatorial Campaign 
in which, while he sustained a technical defeat, he 
gained a substantial victory; it found its culmina- 
tion on the evening of the fourteenth day of April, 
1865, when the sharp pistol report announced with 
terrible inarticulateness, " it is finished." 

And let it not grieve us overmuch, beloved breth- 
ren, that the conscious life of our late honored Pres- 
ident ceased in the theatre of our National Capital. 
He was there, not for the purpose of gratifying him- 
self, but at a personal sacrifice, and for the sake of 
the people whom he loved. For this is the state- 
ment of the public prints : a The President and Mrs. 
Lincoln did not start for the theatre until fifteen 
minutes after eight o'clock. Speaker Colfax was at 
the White House at the time, and the President 
stated to him that he was going, although Mrs. Lin- 
coln had not been well, because the papers had an- 
nounced that General Grant and they would be 
present, and as General Grant had gone North he 
did not wish the audience to be disappointed. He 
went with apparent reluctance, and urged Mr, Col- 
fax to go with him ; but that gentleman had made 
other arrangements, and, with Mr. Ashmun of 
Massachusetts, bade him Good Bye." " He did not 
wish the audience to be disappointed," — this was the 



reason of his presence at the theatre on that fateful 
evening; and the sentiment which dictated the 
words has given character to all his private and pub- 
lic life. 

One year ago the eighteenth day of next month 
it was my privilege to meet President Lincoln in the 
executive chamber of the White House, in company 
with a delegation from the Methodist General Con- 
ference, then in session in Philadelphia. I remem- 
ber that in replying to the address which was read 
to him he expressed in a most devout manner his 
gratitude to God for giving to the government the 
sympathy and support of the churches. And here 
are words which I wrote soon after the interview, 
and which I repeat to you in order that you may 
know the impression which the personal presence of 
the man produced upon me : " The President looks 
thin i care-worn. I believe with all my heart 
that he bears this great nation like a burden on his 
life. God strengthen and guide him ! " 

I saw many senators at that time, and many of 
the representatives in Congress, and the heads of 
some of the departments ; and I recollect that while 
many of them were rubicund and jovial, and others 
showed in their countenances only the resultant 
fatigue of their labor, — the form of the. President 
was bowed as by the superimposition of a crushing 



9 

load, his flesh was wasted as by the consuming flames 
of incessant solicitude, and his face was thin and fur- 
rowed and pale as though it had become spiritual- 
ized by the vicarious pain which he endured in bear- 
ing in himself the calamities of his country. 

And just that suffering, worn, martyr-like form 
and face of his which I looked upon a little less than 
one year ago ; just that unselfish love and sympa- 
thy for others which expressed itself in every linea- 
ment and gesture;— interpret to me the self-deny- 
ing presence at the theatre, on the night of his 
immolation, of the noble Atlas on whose shoulders 
for four bloody years our political world has rested. 

Oh memorable Good Friday, henceforth a day of 
sad reminiscences in the calendar of country as well 
as church ! While I was walking the last evening 
but one under the solemn stars, all ignora^' ~<f the 
disastrous presence of the destroying angc in the 
land, and the tardy moon was peering over the 
eastern horizon as if reluctant to look upon the in- 
fernal deed which was accomplishing, two fiends in 
the guise of men, or two maniacs whose insanity is 
a crime, the creatures of the ghastly rebellion which 
has reared its horrid front in the South and has had 
shameful affiliation with dastardly reptiles of the 
North, were finishing, each his own hideous work, in 

our nation's capital. The one was permitted by an 

2 



10 



inscrutable Providence in the presence of a crowded 
assembly to consummate his purpose upon the life 
of him whom the world was delighting to honor. 
The other, with a daring which is well-nigh unparal- 
leled, overthrowing all who resisted his progress, 
forced his way into the chamber of the Secretary of 
State who was slowly recovering from recent inju- 
ries, and plunged the fierce knife again and again 
into his neck, that column which sustained as royal 
a brain as the present age possesses. 

God's lightning, speeding along the wires, has 
since told us that the President is dead ; and that 
the life of Secretary Seward hangs upon a thread 
which the gentlest strain would break. 

Night of crime and horrors ! what pen can write 
thy cursed record ! 

Friends, we will not forget to pray to God for the 
life of our Secretary of State ; we will not forget to 
implore God to be a Husband to the widow and a 
Father to the fatherless; — but there is one form, 
lying in state in the nation's chamber of love, upon 
which all our eyes do bend in inexpressible grief. 

Ah, how does the splendid life of him who was 
the beauty of our national Israel, unveil itself now 
before us, that we may appreciate how much we 
have lost. 

We remember his obscure birth in Hardin 



11 

County, Kentucky. We remember how at eight 
years of age his sturdy arms swung the axe in the 
forests of Indiana ; and how the next ten years of 
his life were mostly occupied in hard labor on his 
father's farm, and how he attended school at inter- 
vals, amounting in the aggregate to only a year, 
which was all the school education he ever received. 
We remember how at the age of nineteen he floated 
down the Mississippi river on a flat-boat to New Or- 
leans. We remember his removal with his father, 
at the age of twenty-one, to Illinois, and his helping 
to build a log cabin for the family home, and his 
making enough rails to fence ten acres of land. We 
hear the sounding strokes of his hammer as he as- 
sisted in the building of a flat-boat which he after- 
wards navigated down the " Father of waters" to its 
mouth. We see him superintending a store and a 
mill, alert to improve every opportunity for advance- 
ment in life. We remember his volunteering for 
the Black Hawk war and his unexpected election to 
the captaincy of his company. We remember his 
borrowing law-books from a neighboring attorney 
which he took in the evening and returned in the 
morning, studying while others slept. We remem- 
ber how the surveyor of his county offered to de- 
pute to him a portion of his work, and how he pro- 
cured a treatise on surveying and a compass and 



12 

chain, and did the work. We remember his rapid 
rise to distinction in the profession which he had 
chosen. We remember his election to the lower 
house of Congress in 1846, and his inflexible, though 
not factious, opposition to slavery during his entire 
term of service. We remember his magnificent 
Senatorial Campaign against Mr. Douglass, and his 
advocacy of truths which became thenceforth clearer 
and dearer to every lover of human freedom. We 
remember his election to the chief magistracy of the 
American republic in the fall of 1860. We remem- 
ber the earnest and tender appeals which he made to 
his misguided brethren of the South in his first in- 
augural address. We remember the sagacity which 
has uniformly characterized his conduct of the gov- 
ernment through the past four years of its peril. 
We remember how long he subordinated his instincts 
against oppression to his convictions of Constitu- 
tional guarantees. We remember his reluctance to 
issue the proclamation of Emancipation, and the 
entire fidelity with which he has since adhered to 
its provisions. We remember the magnanimous 
words which he spoke to those who announced to 
him his nomination for the Presidency. We re- 
member the total absence of personal triumph and 
of malevolence against his foes and ours, which dis- 
tinguished his second inaugural. And we remem- 



13 

ber — for it is a thing of yesterday — the yearning of 
his great, brotherly heart toward the people of the 
insurgent states so soon as their capital was taken 
and their only formidable army was either captured 
or destroyed. 

Oh, friends, our loss is irreparable. His heart 
was a woman's heart. His genius belonged to the 
philosopher ; his intellect belonged to the statesman. 
The caution which used to vex us who were more 
eager than wise, was the child of a tender heart and 
a sagacious brain. When in the depot of his own 
city, whence he was just setting forth to enter upon 
the duties of his high office, he asked for the prayers 
of his townsmen, he gave token of being possessed 
of that kind of soul which is receptive of the inspi- 
ration of the Almighty ; and that God who raised 
him up for this critical period of our national his- 
tory has inspired him for the successful accomplish- 
ment of the stupendous work which was committed 
to his hands. 

A rare man was our martyred President, a rare 
character was his. Such was his greatness, that our 
wisest men are fearful of trusting any other hands 
than his at the helm of our ship of state. Such was 
the affection which his gentleness awakened, that 
women wept yesterday as though their babes had 



14 

perished, and little children bore the news of his 
death to their parents in tears. 

And can not we say together to-day : more blessed 
is Abraham Lincoln, who was slain on Friday night, 
than is Jefferson Davis, who, if he escape the hand 
of human justice, must skulk through the world 
with the crime of treason upon his heart and the 
mark of Cain upon his brow and the maledictions 
of futurity upon his memory forever. 

Wherever the body of Abraham Lincoln shall be 
buried, there will be established a national shrine 
which shall share the honor of pilgrimages with the 
tomb of the illustrious hero who sleeps his long sleep 
amid the classic shades of Mount Vernon. Rest 
henceforth in peace ye ashes of our glorified pat- 
riots ! Commune ye now in the land of spirits, oh 
elected souls of God ! 

But, friends, it is time that I should turn away 
from him who has so long fascinated to himself my 
thoughts and words. The eulogy of our departed 
father and friend which you required of me, has 
been pronounced. My grief which yesterday found 
only partial gratification in my tears, is further 
soothed by the tribute of affection which I have now 
publicly paid to the beloved and honored dead. 

But there remains for me a duty to you who hear 
me. God visits no such providence, smites with no 



15 - 

such smiting, as this, without a reason and purpose. 
Is it immodest in me to assume that it is my office 
to voice your inquiries after the meaning of this 
mournful event ? 

(1.) Observe, then, that we needed just this, per- 
haps, not only to learn the hideous enormity of the 
slave-holders' rebellion and of all sympathy with it 
from every quarter, but also for the sufficient atone- 
ment for it and proper settlement of it. Treason, mur- 
der, assassination, and all mentionable crimes, are the 
woof which has from the first been woven into the 
warp of this gigantic and infernal rebellion. Disre- 
gard of human life, contempt for the divine au- 
thority which is vested in human rulers, supreme 
disdain of one who has risen from the obscurest con- 
dition to the highest office of state, eagerness to 
smite down the man who has been smitten by the 
bullet of the desperado, — all these are the legitimate 
fruitage of the barbarous institution of slavery 
which has risen against the national life. The hor- 
rible crime of Friday night has taught us that root 
and stem and branch of the rebellion are accursed, 
that there is nothing supremely abominable and 
devilish of which it is not capable. Every man, to- 
gether with every woman, of the North, who has 
hitherto launched fiercer invectives against the gov- 
ernment and its friends than against the spurious 



16 

confederacy and its friends, and who does not from 
this day eat the hellish words which he has spoken 
and repent of his well-nigh unpardonable sin, is an 
abandoned traitor, and deserves to be hanged ten 
thousand times higher than Haman, and to sink ten 
thousand times deeper into the pit than he. His 
sin, if it shall continue, is sin against light clearer 
than noon-day, and is capable of no extenuation. 

But not only does the tragic event which we are 
commemorating betoken the fiendish nature of the 
rebellion; it was needed also, perchance, for the suffi- 
cient atonement for it, and proper settlement of it. 
If I am unwittingly blasphemous, forgive me, — but 
when God would bring an apostate humanity into 
reconciliation with himself, the sacrifice of his only 
and well-beloved Son was requisite to the realization 
of his purpose and desire. 

So, when our national government would bring 
back to allegiance to itself its millions of apostate 
subjects, it was requisite that he who was dearest to 
all loyal hearts should be offered in sacrifice. We 
had already given our treasure, and our husbands 
and fathers and brothers and sons. They had been 
laid upon the altar and were consumed. We thought 
our offering was costly enough, and that none cost- 
lier would be demanded. But there was a man, 
occupying the highest office of state, dear to all loyal 



17 

hearts, the nation's father and brother and son, more 
anointed than any other with the holy chrism of a 
great people's love. The government was upon his 
shoulders, but he must be, nevertheless, yea, because 
of his office, the lamb of sacrifice. 

There is a Roman legend that the ground in the 
middle of the Forum sank down to an immense 
depth, leaving a chasm which could not be filled. 
At last the soothsayers declared that if the Roman 
empire was to endure, that must be devoted to the 
chasm which constituted the principal strength of 
the Roman people. When all shrank back aghast, 
Marcus Curtius, a noble youth, knowing that courage 
and consecration to country were the strength of the 
empire, armed himself in complete armor, mounted 
his horse, and leaped into the abyss. Lo, the yawn- 
ing jaws of the earth came together with a shock, 
and Rome was saved. 

Is it hard for you to believe, my friends, that if 
we could have overheard the secret prayers of Abra- 
ham Lincoln, we might have listened to such words 
as these, " Oh, God, use me as thou wilt for the sal- 
vation of my beloved country?" Just that prayer 
from the best beloved man of the nation God may 
have waited for long : just that prayer he answered 
on Good Friday night. God accepted the costly and 

self-devoted sacrifice which we had not dreamed of 

2 



18 

offering. The "Lo I come to do thy will, oh God," 
which fell from the lips of Jesus when he made him- 
self the Lamb of sacrifice for the restoration of an 
apostate humanity to allegiance to the divine gov- 
ernment, fell not sacrilegiously from the lips of our 
late heroic President when he consecrated himself 
to his country and became the requisite sacrifice for 
the restoration of rebellious citizens to allegiance to 
just authority. 

And as the tragedy of the cross has startled tens 
of thousands of sinners into a recognition of their 
sins, while it expressed the inflexibility of God's law 
and authority, so we may hope that the tragedy of 
last Friday night will startle multitudes of rebels, 
North as well as South, into a recognition of their 
crime, stiffen the government, which might other- 
wise bend, into requisite rigidness, and hasten the 
consummation of peace for which we devoutly pray. 

The last and costliest offering which God demand- 
ed has been taken; and as on the first Good Friday 
peace was secured between an apostate race and 
God, so we will trust that on the last Good Friday 
peace was secured between the contending regions 
of our distracted country. 

(2.) If your meditations have been like mine, 
friends, you have already framed a second inquiry. 
Who are responsible for the assassination of Abraham 



19 

Lincoln, and who share the guilt? The question 
which I have asked, I dare answer. I have already 
shown that the open enemy are responsible, and 
share the guilt. But this is not the whole answer. 
The event about which our thoughts and regrets 
cluster was, partly at least, the result of a false opin- 
ion which has been industriously promulgated, and 
of a diabolical sentiment which has been generated, 
in almost every community of the North. That 
opinion is that the President of the Republic was a 
tyrant who ought to be resisted and overthrown. 
That sentiment is unappeasable and pitiless hatred 
of him. 

Now it will doubtless prove that the assassin of 
Abraham Lincoln, although used as a tool by our 
Southern enemies, was not merely a hireling, but 
one who had been brought to believe that the exe- 
cution of his purpose would be an act alike of pat- 
riotism and piety. When he leaped upon the stage 
of the theatre, crying "sic semper tyrannis," "be it 
ever thus with tyrants," it was evident that he be- 
lieved himself to have accomplished a truly just and 
heroic deed. 

If, now, you inquire who is directly responsible 
for the assassination of Good Friday night, I answer, 
that in addition to our enemies in the South, it is 
those men of the North who promulgated the false 



20 

opinion and generated the infernal sentiment to 
which I have alluded above, and which made the 
assassin the fanatic and monomaniac that he is. And 
if you ask who share the guilt of the horrible crime 
which we are considering, I answer, that it is every 
man and woman who has shared the above men- 
tioned opinion and sentiment. They share the guilt, 
though their influence may not have extended far 
enough to participate in the criminal act, j List as sin- 
ners to-day share the guilt of the crucifixion of 
Christ. 

Let me particularize. All those editors of politi- 
cal papers who during the last Presidential campaign 
declared over and over again that Abraham Lincoln 
was a tyrant worthy of universal execration : all 
those demagogues who trumpeted the same false- 
hood in the ears of fierce and ignorant mobs : that 
man of New Haven, who asked in a public harangue, 
"who is the greatest traitor, Jefferson Davis or Abra- 
ham Lincoln?" that man of Hartford, who, if rumor 
be true, at the breaking out of the rebellion invested 
a thousand dollars in South Carolina bonds, in token 
of his sympathy with the crime of treason : that 
man who once held office in the President's cabinet, 
and who has never since broken his infamous silence 
except to malign the government which protected 
instead of hanging him : these are the men who 



21 

share the responsibility of the murder of Abraham 
Lincoln. They helped to produce the opinion and 
sentiment which produced the man who did the 
deed. Blood is upon their souls. Wash they their 
hands never so much, as did Pontius Pilate, they can 
never be made clean. 

Shall I also particularize those who share, not the 
responsibility, but the guilt, of the murder of Good 
Friday night ? I answer, all those obscure and un- 
nflu ential men who have shared the opinion and 
sentiment which I have mentioned, but who have 
not been capable of extensively promulgating them. 
That alderman in our city government who said yes- 
terday, "I have been waiting four years for some 
damned black republican bones, to make bone dust 
to put around my vines, and I dont know but there 
is a prospect of my getting some now." That man, 
those men indeed, who were guilty of the substan- 
tial, if not the identical, expression, "I am glad that 
Abraham Lincoln was shot, and I would like to go 
down and dance on his coffin." That employee of 
the Springfield and New Haven railroad who ex- 
pressed joy at the murder of Mr. Lincoln, and 
remarked that "he ought to have been shot four 
years ago." Every man who has felt a secret joy at 
the horrible tragedy of the night before the last. 



22 

Every man who has not been carrying a mourning 
heart all yesterday and to-day. 

Shall I include any women in this infamous cata- 
log-lie ? women who ought to share the sweetness 
and tenderness of womanhood ? I will not dishonor 
the mother who bore me by bringing so horrible a 
charge against her sex. But if I could speak to all 
the women of the land I would say, if you have ever 
thought or felt murder against Abraham Lincoln, the 
event of last Friday night is the voice of God call- 
ing you to repent in dust and ashes. And if it be 
true, as is reported, that a woman, whose name I do 
not know, said yesterday, that "she was glad Abra- 
ham Lincoln was shot, and she hoped Jefferson Davis 
might assume his place," I can say that rather than 
meet her in the way I would be confronted by all 
the raging Furies of Tartarus. Oh, woman! as thou 
canst be most tender and forgiving, so canst thou be 
most vindictive and implacable. 

Thus I have shown you who they are who share 
the responsibility of the assassination of Abraham 
Lincoln, and who they are who share only the guilt. 
There is a proper attitude toward these men which 
we have not yet assumed. Friendship, fraternization, 
forbearance with them, should cease till they purge 
themselves of their crime. The lines must be drawn, 
and even households be divided if necessary, as our 



23 

Savior has predicted. Toleration of traitors and 
murderers and makers of murderers is not a virtue, 
it is a vice. The wine of our national life must be- 
come pure by separating itself from the lees of dis- 
loyalty. I have shown you the men, friends, deal 
with them as you will. 

(3.) One other thought remains to be expressed, 
a thought of consolation for the future. 

We have lost our Palinurus, our helmsman, and 
our ship of state is adrift on a stormy sea. Has God 
no greater Elisha to succeed the departed Elijah? 
Must we despair of reaching the haven of a victori- 
ous and holy peace ? 

All yesterday and to-day I have been comforting 
myself with the reflection that God is alive and on 
the throne. The christian men and women whom I 
have met have lifted faces to heaven upon which 
was the expression of holy trust and serenity. 

Although we were not aware of it, we have been 
for a considerable time past placing our confidence 
in our lamented President rather than in our God. 
And since his second inauguration, on which occasion 
Andrew Johnson brought shame upon himself and 
the nation, we have come almost to believe that the 
destiny of our country was suspended upon the sin- 
gle life of Abraham Lincoln. 

God has smitten clown him upon whom our faith 



24 

was impiously, reposed, in order that he might trans- 
fer our faith to himself. And in one short hour he 
has accomplished what he undertook. There is not 
a christian man before me, nor in the whole broad 
land, who has not leaned more heavily upon God, 
and been more consciously sustained, during yester- 
day and to-day, than for months before. We recog- 
nize our need of the divine arm, and lo, we feel our- 
selves embraced by it and upheld. 

More than this, I believe that God purposes to 
bring final deliverance to the republic by the same 
Andrew Johnson in whom on the fourth day of last 
March we lost faith. Not only was the man whom 
we trusted taken away, but the man whom we dis- 
trusted is made the captain of our hosts. Him will 
God anoint for our salvation. 

For, friends, I knoio that God will save this nation. 
Our whole history, and especially the history of the 
last four years, would be nothing else than an ex- 
crescence upon the trunk of time, if we should not 
reach a higher national perfection and prosperity 
than we have yet realized. 

And since I know that the republic will be deliv- 
ered, I have all faith that Andrew Johnson will be 
used for the accomplishment of our deliverance. 

True, he stumbled fearfully at the start. But 
there has been wrought a marvelous change in the 



25 

man during the forty-one days which have since 
elapsed. If that maudlin speech of his in the Sen- 
ate chamber on the fourth of March was a disgrace 
to himself and to the nation, his speech yesterday on 
the occasion of taking the oath of the Presidential 
office, and his manly, yet humble and devout bear- 
ing, more than atoned for the earlier folly. 

Do you not remember how we lost faith in Gen. 
Ulysses Grant at the bloody battle of Pittsburg Land- 
ing, and afterward during the siege of Vicksburg ? 
But he was God's anointed man, and to-day we es- 
teem him second to no captain whom the world has 
produced. 

Do you not remember how our confidence in 
Abraham Lincoln was shaken when he went from 
Springfield to Washington, making little speeches 
from the platform of the car all the way. To-day 
we lament him as one of the greatest statesmen 
whom history celebrates. 

And it is a singular fact that during this great 
conflict those men of whom we had the highest 
hopes at the beginning of their career, have signally 
failed ; while they whom at the outset we distrusted, 
have attained to preeminent success. 

And so my faith in God's using of Andrew John- 
son for our national salvation is all the greater be- 
4 



26 

cause the beginning of his more exalted career was 
so inauspicious. 

But there is another phase of the general thought 
which we are considering to which I invite your at- 
tention. Abraham Lincoln's work is done. There- 
fore, we can say, since God is in this thing, that on 
the evening of the fourteenth day of the present 
April his work tvas done. From that time God had 
no further use for him in the position which he held. 
At that time God had use for Andrew Johnson in the 
place which was left vacant. 

Can we not detect some reasons for this providence 
of God? 

It seems plain to me that our late President was 
peculiarly adapted to the work which he has accom- 
plished, and to the past phases of the great conflict 
which is now approaching its end. His tenderness 
and spirit of conciliation at the beginning, which 
left no excuse to the rebels for a resort to arms ; his 
wonderful caution, which did not permit him to pass 
beyond the sympathy and support of the people ; 
his humaneness which forbade his starving the pris- 
oners of the rebels because they starved ours; — 
these were qualities which eminently fitted him for 
the conduct of the war. 

But it is more than possible, it is even more than 
probable, that just these qualities unfitted him for 



27 

the final settlement of this conflict. There was dan- 
ger that he would subordinate his executive func- 
tions to his personal sympathies ; that he would for- 
get that God had placed the sword of retributive 
justice in his hands to be used ; that he would feel 
that the traitors had suffered enough already, and 
needed no further punishment ; that he would even 
pardon Davis and Stephens and Johnston and Lee 
if they should come into his power. He was drift- 
ing in that direction, and most of us were drifting 
with him. 

But, friends, the vindication of this outraged gov- 
ernment, and its dignity and safety for the future, 
demand that treason be judicially punished in the 
persons of the chief traitors. Treason has not been 
punished yet ; the losses its authors and abettors have 
suffered have been the natural consequences alone of 
our own efforts for self-defence. Just and formal pun- 
ishment demands the conviction of the criminal by 
due process of law. As the proportions of the rebell- 
ion wane the time approaches when retributive jus- 
tice can execute itself. And it must be that retribu- 
tive justice be executed, or our conceptions of gov- 
ernment and law will become totally debauched. 

I say, then, there was danger that the late Presi- 
dent, by reason of his kindness of heart, would not 
be equal to the retributive work which was soon to 



28 

be required of him ; that pardoning the very arch- 
rebels themselves he would fail to place upon the 
crime of treason its appropriate stigma, and thus 
encouraging future rebellion, endanger the future 
of the republic. If he was in danger of this mis- 
take, then his work was done ; and therefore God 
translated him, having already so nobly done, to 
glory. 

But Andrew Johnson, a man of nerve, has had 
his heart under the iron heel of this rebellion. He 
appreciates treason. His sense of justice is para- 
mount to his tender sensibilities. He holds a double- 
edged and keen-edged sword which reaches to the 
southermost point of Florida. Therefore I believe 
that God has raised him up to bring this rebellion to 
the consummation of just retribution. It is not pri- 
vate revenge that he will wreak, but the vengeance 
of God, whose anointed minister he is. And so God 
has given him to the nation when the nation needed 
him. And we will lift our reverent eyes to heaven 
to-day, and, gazing through our tears, say, " Thou 
doest all things well." 

Abraham Lincoln's memory will be greener for- 
ever that he did the work he did, and finished it 
when he did. The nation will understand ere long 
that the dark Providence of last Friday night was a 
merciful Providence. Andrew Johnson is the Joshua 



29 

whom God has appointed to consummate the work 
which our dead Moses so nobly commenced. 

And so, on this Easter Sunday, the anniversary 
of our Lord's resurrection, we cross the threshold 
which introduces us as a nation to a career of unex- 
ampled victory and puissance and glory. And 
though the body of our late honored President re- 
poses to-day in melancholy state, and we weep as we 
look upon it, yet as Christian men and women we 
will cry one to another, " Rejoice, for the Lord God 
omnipotent reigneth ; and he will save the people 
whom he has redeemed with the precious blood of 
his only Son." 



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